Another Look at the Confederate Battle Flag

 

I thought I had posted this before, but it didn't come up on a search.

Recently Mr. Donald Fraser wrote a column in my hometown newspaper, the Northeast Georgian, titled “Battle Flag Promotes Hate, Not Heritage.” He opened his article expressing a twinge of fear that he would probably not make many friends. I am glad, however, he is willing to say what he believes even at the expense of offending others, a luxury often denied those who find themselves on the other side of the flag issue. I am also happy for him to have his say because I appreciate one thing the Confederate battle flag stands for: freedom. In that spirit, I offered another perspective (in shorter form—500 words) in the same paper.

St. Andrew’s Cross, the “X” on the battle flag, is a long revered Christian symbol from Scotland—from which many of our forebears in Northeast Georgia immigrated. Just as Wallace of Braveheart fame cried “Freedom!”–the flag was a visible symbol of that same cry. Many soldiers in modern wars (WWII and Vietnam for example) carried this flag as a reminder of liberty. German citizens flew it at the fall of the Berlin wall, and Romanians under communist rule called it the “freedom flag.” More than a piece of cloth came down the pole on South Carolina’s capital grounds. Hundreds of years of rich and revered tradition came down as well.

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